Free Five on Finniston Farm by Enid Blyton Page B

this."
    Alas! George little knew that every single word had been overheard by Junior, whose left ear was stil pinned to the knot-hole in the wood! His face was red with surprise and delight. WHAT a secret! Whatever would his Pop say? Dungeons! Perhaps ful of gold and jewels and al kinds of things! He rubbed his hands together in delight, thinking that he would soon get even with these annoying children now - as soon as his Pop came home, he"d spil everything to him.
    GEE!
    Timmy heard the smal sound of Junior rubbing his hands together, and sat up, growling, his ears pricked. Snippet growled too, a miniature little sound that nobody took seriously.
    Timmy then heard Junior creeping away, afraid because he had heard the big dog growling. Timmy growled again, and then barked sharply, running to the shut door of the hen-house, scraping at it with his foot.
    „Somebody"s outside - quick! If it"s Junior, I"l throw him on to the muck-heap!" yelled Dick, and flung open the door. They all trooped out and looked round - but there was nobody there! Junior had shot off at top speed, and was now safely behind the nearest hedge.
    „What was it, Tim?" said George. She turned to the others. „He may have heard those hens scratching near the door," she said. „There"s no one about. Gosh, I was so afraid that it was that little sneak of a Junior! He"d tell his Pop every single thing!"
    „Twins, listen - Mr Finniston told us that one of the things that was saved from the castle - or found afterwards, perhaps - was a great old oak door, iron-studded," said Anne, suddenly remembering. „Is that one of your kitchen doors?"
    „Yes - that must be the door leading into the dark little passage," said Harry. „You wouldn"t have noticed it particularly, because it"s usual y kept open, and it"s very dark just there.
    Gosh, I suppose it could have come from the castle. It"s enormously thick and strong. I wonder if Dad knows."
    „We"ll tell him," said Harriet. „I say - shal we go and look for the site of the castle sometime? If only we could find it! Do you suppose that if we found the cel ars and dungeons, full of chests and things, they"d belong to us? The farm belongs to our family, of course, and al the land round."
    „Does it? Well then, of course anything found on this land would be yours!" said Julian.
    „We might be able to buy a new tractor!" said the twins, both together, in the same excited voice.
    „Let"s go and look for the castle-site now," said George, her voice sounding so excited that Timmy sat up and barked.
    „No. We must finish this job," said Julian. „We promised we would. There"s plenty of time to hunt around, because nobody knows about this except us."
    Julian was wrong, of course. Junior knew - and Junior meant to tell the whole secret to his father as soon as ever he could! He could hardly wait for him to come home.
    „Well, we"d better be getting back to the house," said George. „We told Mrs Philpot we"d pick some raspberries for supper tonight, so we"d better fetch baskets, and begin. Oh, I do HOPE we find that castle-site. I shal dream about it tonight, I know I shal ."
    „Well, try and dream where it is," said Julian, with a laugh. „Then you can lead us straight to it tomorrow morning. I suppose you haven"t any idea where it might be, have you, twins?"
    „No," they said together, frowning. „No idea at all!" And Harriet added, „You see, the farm"s so big - and I suppose it might have been built anywhere on our land."
    „Yes - but probably near the top of a hil ," said Julian. „Castles used to overlook surrounding land, you know, so that approaching enemies could easily be seen. And then again, George said Mr Finniston told them that the Lady of the castle escaped with her children and took them in safety to the chapel, which wouldn"t be very far away. I should guess that the castle-site must be not further than a quarter of a mile from the chapel, so that narrows the search down a bit. By the way,